


Apprentice and Padawan

by Morgyn Leri (morgynleri)



Series: Seeds of the Dark [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, GFY, Other, Sith
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-05
Updated: 2016-04-05
Packaged: 2018-05-31 11:21:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,149
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6468211
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/morgynleri/pseuds/Morgyn%20Leri
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Geonosis, Anakin wants to know when Obi-Wan turned to the Dark Side.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Apprentice and Padawan

**Author's Note:**

  * For [OwlFlight](https://archiveofourown.org/users/OwlFlight/gifts).



"When?" Anakin very deliberately pays attention to the adjustments he's making to his new arm instead of Obi-Wan. Trying very hard to pretend he's not afraid of Obi-Wan, of what he saw while laying there with his arm severed. When Obi-Wan had ignored wounds that Anakin had thought put him down for the count, and gone after Dooku's head, darkness spilling out around their fight, and eyes gold as the metal that now makes up a large part of Anakin's right arm.

"You'll have to be more specific, Anakin. When what?" Obi-Wan is examining the crystals from his lightsaber, the blue stones rotating in the air in front of him. Looking for flaws that might have been introduced by the fight with Dooku, Anakin thinks.

Anakin glances at the crystals, wondering that all he feels from Obi-Wan is the same calm and light that he had all his life. How could he hide that sort of darkness so well? "When did you become a Sith?"

"Ah." Obi-Wan lowers the crystals gently, the stone barely even clicking as they come to rest on the table. "Look at me, Anakin. Please."

It takes a moment and a deep breath, but Anakin manages it. Sees only the familiar green-blue eyes of his teacher, the soft smile that Obi-Wan only lets show when they're in their quarters, where no one else can see it.

"When you first met me, what did you see?"

"A Jedi." Anakin frowns, not sure what he's supposed to say. "Qui-Gon's student." He hadn't paid a lot of attention to Obi-Wan when they met on Padmé's ship.

"And later? When we went back to Naboo?"

Anakin shrugs, looking down at his hand a moment with a frown. "You were sad and hurt because Qui-gon wanted to take me as his apprentice, and you hadn't stopped being his apprentice yet. Grieving after Qui-Gon was killed."

"And nothing more?" The smile on Obi-Wan's face is more a grin now, amused and friendly.

"Should I have seen something?"

Obi-Wan smiles a moment longer before it fades, and he shakes his head. "You were nine, Anakin, just taken from your mother, and thrust into a completely different world. I'd had years to learn how to hide, and hide well."

Anakin nods, and looks back down at what he's doing, before deciding that he has to test the adjustments eventually. Silence falls between them while he checks the range of motion of his hand, and Obi-Wan returns to his inspection of his lightsaber.

"Was Qui-Gon a Sith, too?"

"No." Obi-Wan floats the crystals back to their brackets, making minute adjustments with the Force to settle them properly. "He was teaching me to be a Jedi. Perhaps a bit of a maverick, as he was, who disregarded parts of the Code, but a Jedi nonetheless."

"Did he know when you became a Sith?"

"No." Obi-Wan sets the lightsaber down, closing his eyes a moment. "He wasn't there when the first seeds were sown. And he wasn't there when I asked my Master to teach me what she promised to when we first met."

"She?" All the Sith Anakin knew about were men, though he's been aware of only three, counting Obi-Wan.

"Yes." Obi-Wan smiles again, amused and weirdly gentle. "Would you like to meet her?"

"She's still alive?" Anakin frowns, confused. "I thought Sith killed their Masters?"

"In a manner of speaking." Obi-Wan waves Anakin to stay while he gets up. "We don't have to go anywhere special for you to meet her, Anakin."

He goes into his room, and when he comes back, sets a dark pyramid on the table between them. Anakin watches curiously as Obi-Wan's fingers dance over the base, pressing in a sequence that goes too quickly for him to memorize.

Obi-Wan glances at him as the sides of the pyramid open halfway down, and split into halves that spread into an eight-petaled flower. "If she likes you, I will show you how to open the holocron later."

"If I like who, my apprentice?" The image hovering over the holocron is small, but detailed in a way that Anakin hasn't seen in holograms. Except for the size and transparency, he'd almost imagine he was seeing a real person.

"My Jedi Padawan." Obi-Wan bows his head to the figure, a warm smile crossing his face. "I am afraid the encounter with Dooku deteriorated a bit faster and more than expected."

"Hmph." The figure glowers at Obi-Wan a moment. "You should have taken along at least the small holocron, so I could have properly terrified the blustering little pretender."

"And reveal who my Master is?" Obi-Wan shakes his head. "No. I'd rather not have either of them know who you are, Master. It gives me an advantage."

"So why reveal me to your Jedi Padawan?" The figure turns to look at Anakin, bright gold eyes peering out of a humanoid face at him. "Or is he an Apprentice, as well?"

"No." Obi-Wan shakes his head. "He came to rescue me, and there was... trouble."

The Sith studies Anakin for a long moment, gaze fixing on his cybernetic arm. "Oh dear. At least it wasn't you." She looks up at Obi-Wan, a sharp smile crossing her face. "I trust that the deterioration was that pretender being dealt with?"

"He knew he was to leave Anakin alone." Obi-Wan's eyes flash the same gold they had on Geonosis, and Anakin shivers at the banked fury there. It's comforting, in a way, to know that Obi-Wan is so protective of him, but the depths of his rage is as frightening in its own way as the capacity of Anakin's own anger.

"And he's dead now?"

"No." Anakin isn't sure he likes being under the scrutiny of both Obi-Wan and the Sith in the holocron. "He threw Dooku into the wall with lightning, and then Master Yoda arrived."

"I didn't have time to do anything else." Obi-Wan reaches out to rest a hand on Anakin's shoulder, warm and comforting. "I'm sorry I frightened you."

Anakin believes Obi-Wan, though he's less certain he's worthy of an apology. Obi-Wan wouldn't have had to do that if Anakin had listened to him.

"Hmph." The Sith shakes her head. "What are you going to do now?"

The question seems evenly directed at Obi-Wan and Anakin, though the quick glance at Obi-Wan is far less wary than the expression the Sith turns on Anakin.

"I don't know." Anakin really doesn't. He knows what he's supposed to do, but he should have done that far earlier, and he'd carefully avoided telling the Jedi Council what he'd seen Obi-Wan do when giving his official report. And it's Obi-Wan. How could he simply tell the Council that he'd seen Obi-Wan do things that the records only say Sith have done, and stand aside while they take away his teacher, his friend, his brother?

"Unless Anakin is planning to tell the Council, nothing." Obi-Wan smiles at Anakin, that warm expression that makes Anakin certain he's at least a little bit in love with him, as much as Anakin is in love with Padmé.

"Nothing?" The Sith gestures at Anakin. "He's a Jedi, Apprentice."

Anakin watches the tiny figure with a rising sense of anxious dread. He doesn't think the Sith can convince Obi-Wan to do anything, but she had said something earlier about terrifying Dooku just by having a smaller holocron there. What could she do here, to him?

"I'm not a very good Jedi," he blurts out, drawing the attention of both the Sith and Obi-Wan from each other. He tries to say more, but he can't find the words, can't speak past the lump that's forming in his throat. Terrified of what Obi-Wan will think of him, even knowing Obi-Wan is a Sith.

Obi-Wan watches him a moment, a small frown on his face, then goes to put on a kettle for hot water, and prepares two mugs with tea. As well as bringing Anakin a glass of water to wet his throat while they wait for the tea. "I think you've been an excellent Jedi Padawan," he says as he sits back in his chair. "I don't say it often enough."

That's true, though Anakin thinks that's mostly because Anakin usually isn't doing good enough to warrent the praise. He smiles a little in return, though, before focusing on the glass of water, and drinking all of it. Maybe it will help the lump and let him get past it.

It doesn't, and neither does the waiting silence from the Sith.

"Is there something in particular that makes you think you aren't a good Jedi?" Obi-Wan prompts after Anakin's finished the water, and still not managed to say anything.

"Maybe." Anakin closes his eyes, and tries again. "I know Jedi aren't supposed to be attached, and I can't. Can't not be."

"The Jedi are blithering idiots with their heads up their arse if they're pushing that bantha-shite." The Sith is, if nothing else, quite blunt about her opinions. "I don't remember them being that stupid when I was fighting them."

"Not everyone agrees with that idea, either." Obi-Wan frowns a little, and reaches out to clasp Anakin's flesh hand in his. "Is that why you never asked to return to Tatooine, to visit your mother?"

"... Yes." Anakin looks down at their clasped hands, his face heating. "I didn't think it would be allowed. You never visit your family."

"Because I can't risk anyone else knowing who they are. My name was changed when I came to the Temple - my parent's wish - and I purged the records of them and stopped talking to my father when I realized that there was another Sith in the Republic."

It doesn't mean other Sith don't know who Obi-Wan's family are, just that they can't find out now if they didn't know already. Anakin snorts softly as he realizes he might have a lot of things he has to rethink about Obi-Wan now, knowing he's not really a Jedi.

"The nightmares about my mother got worse when I was on Naboo with Padmé... Senetor Amidala. She suggested going to Tatooine to make sure mom was alright, and Watto had sold her to a moisture farmer, who'd freed her," Anakin manages a smile, glad to know someone had kept his promise, even if he hadn't, to free his mother, "and married her."

Obi-Wan is quiet a moment, giving Anakin room to continue on his own, though Anakin is sure he thinks this isn't cause for nightmares. And that part, the part he hadn't really known, wasn't.

He closes his eyes a moment, struggling with the rage that wells up when he thinks of what he found out at the farm. What he found later at the camp.

"Tuskens had taken my mother. They almost killed her, Obi-Wan. Tortured her." He wishes he could say he doesn't remember what happened after he found his mother clearly. Wishes that he could have said he just took her home, so she could recover from her ordeal.

"Did she die?" The Sith isn't so willing as Obi-Wan to give him time to try to leash his anger, and Anakin glares at her a moment.

"If I'd been there a day later, she would have." Anakin is certain of it. "I took her back to the speeder, and Owen - he's my step-brother now, I met him when I went to the farm - was there with another one. Said he'd followed me so Padmé didn't put herself in danger." If Owen hadn't followed him, Anakin thinks he might have been able to walk away. Might have left the Tuskens alive.

Obi-Wan squeezes his hand when he's been silent too long. "What happened next, Anakin?"

"I killed them. Owen took mom home, and I killed them. All of them." Anakin pauses, closing his eyes again. "Not the younglings. They couldn't have. Could they?"

"Participated? Unlikely." Obi-Wan doesn't sound upset by what Anakin's told him, and Anakin opens his eyes to look at Obi-Wan carefully.

"Oh, this is wonderful." The Sith smiles when Anakin gives her an incredulous look. "Anger is a wonderful thing. Transformative. And vengeance feels so good, doesn't it?"

"No." The denial escapes Anakin almost before the Sith finishes asking her question, though he feels guilt worm through him. It had felt good, then. He still can't summon up as much remorse as he should at the deaths. At leaving the younglings to potentially starve or die of dehydration without their parents.

The Sith's smile widens, and she shakes her head. "I think you do have an Apprentice as well as a Padawan, little one. You should keep him."

"I intend to." Obi-Wan smiles, and though there's a bit of sadness in it, Anakin's heart leaps at the sentiment behind the words. That he hopes is behind the words. He wants to keep Obi-Wan, too.

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on tumblr 9 February 2016.
> 
> For the prompt: Star Wars. Anakin/Obi-Wan; "Show me how to lie/I'm getting better all the time/And turning all against one/Is an art that's hard to teach."


End file.
